


Changeling, Son of Death

by ScreechingPotatoFics



Category: Diabolik Lovers
Genre: Fae & Fairies, Gen, Sexual Harassment
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-05
Updated: 2019-06-09
Packaged: 2020-03-26 16:43:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19009744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScreechingPotatoFics/pseuds/ScreechingPotatoFics
Summary: It is far easier to serve your Queen than to turn your back on all that she has provided for you. Even if it means sacrificing yourself to teach impure, immature vampires to repay her debt. Even if it means being poisoned by residing in their home. Even if it means you must turn your back on a pure girl destined to live in your Court.Then again, someone who grew up human might not take orders as well as he should.





	1. A Changeling’s Return

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This seems like more of a thing deserving of Quotev, specifically because it's based off of a crack/ragefic I never finished (that used be on that website). It's more of an exercise in character building than anything else. Enjoy. Or don't.

“Young Hesperus, you are aware of your debt to our kind.”

Despite the years he’d spent in this court, he never seemed to get used to the Queen’s cold voice. His fear would have been instantaneous if he hadn’t been dwelling in this realm for years already.

He nodded solemnly, refusing to rise to his feet until given instruction.

The Queen laughed deeply from her chest, a deeply attractive sound that sent a flash of fiery heat into his heart, melting the chains she’d placed around it. He could hear her bare feet walk closer to him on the marble-like substance that grew from beneath her throne. 

The cold air around him seemed to imprison his lungs.

“Recite to me the humans’ little rhyme about us. Rise and tell me that silly poem once more,” she said in a voice that felt so much like a mother’s.

The young gentleman gracefully stood from his kneeling position, clumsiness long since conquered by smooth movements learned in years past. His short black hair was combed neatly to show his full face and sharp eyes the color of moss. Next to the Queen, he was not handsome, but young and childish with rounded, feminine features.

“Change is good, glamour is free. Honor is a lie, passion before duty.”

As he said this, he studied the Queen’s amused expression. The sharp slope of her nose was only accentuated by the wide smile on her pale, thin lips. Her eyes were closed as if she needed to dull one sense to fully appreciate the young gentleman’s voice.

A few moments passed before the Queen placed a pale hand on Hesperus’s face, the draping sleeve of her dress brushing against the thick material of his waistcoat.

The young gentleman’s breath caught in his throat when she placed an icy kiss to his cheek.

“Do not forget about your family while you are gone, sweet changeling. We abhor the iron that will wind itself around your neck.”

He could not tell whether the Queen’s melodious voice was speaking of the dangers of staying in the human realm or the danger of disobeying her. But he had no time to mull it over in his head, for the throne room around him was gone and he was greeted with the gentle whispers of trees surrounding him.

There was once a time when the young man had felt more like a little boy caught between two worlds he could never live in fully. But now, as he watched the sun reflect shades of orange and purple into the sky, he knew he could only live as what he was— a changeling. His family was not particularly unwelcoming, but he felt the disdain in his father’s eyes as the esteemed Winter Gentleman was forced to snap a silver-eyed girl’s neck upon his arrival. The Queen began to favor Hesperus as he grew into his role of gentleman, even bestowing upon him the very name he bore like a seal of pride on his chest.

All the young man could do now was wait for night as he attempted to glamour himself. Kneeling on the ground, he scraped dark soil into his hand. He willed the energy to flow through his hand, up his arm, and into his eyes. A slight sensation of pins and needles assured him of his eyes’ new color. 

It was not the night-school uniform or the lack of glamour for his hair that vexed him in regards to the rest of the glamour, but his face. The Queen’s sharp features reduced him to a mere child, as did those of every other Gentleman and Court Lady. Even the other returned changelings had grown faster into their inherited facial structures than he who dwelled in the Winter Court for hundreds of years before them. Was it worse for the young gentleman to use his glamour to look the way a human of seventeen must, or to keep his effeminate features for the possible ridicule of his new charges?

As he mulled over the question, he quickly realized that night had already fallen; his body had not yet gotten used to a mortal day. He almost laughed at his shame. Forgetting himself mere hours after arriving... The Queen would not enjoy this.

 

Less than a week after his arrival in the human realm, he had registered himself under the name of Tsuneo Akiyama. His features did not lead to ridicule as he had imagined, but became somewhat of an asset. It was easy for him to slip into the role of innocent student when he was asked about his whereabouts during such and such a scandal. 

Oddly enough, his Queen had neglected the ridiculous variance between his charges. Two of these charges happened to be creating these scandals left and right with no regard for their own reputations. Two nearly identical charges of six. A young man who appeared to act like a young boy rounded out the triplets, stuffed animal included. The eldest caused no trouble since Hesperus had arrived, but the second-eldest constantly reeked of chemicals (no doubt undetectable to humans). The final of his charges needed to go to an anger management course, and possibly a therapist, but that was the most information Hesperus had gained.

As he waited for the lunch period to be over, he recited their names internally to ensure his remembrance. There was no need to speak to other students with his head resting on his arms as he feigned falling asleep as his desk.

Until a dark presence loomed over him, reeking of... formaldehyde and chlorine.

Tsuneo slowly looked up at his charge. It wasn’t hard for him to feign fatigue, either, as his prolonged use of glamour was beginning to weigh on him.

“May I speak with you for a moment, Underclassman Akiyama?” 

The harsh tone of Reiji Sakamaki’s voice gave Tsuneo a reason to cower. But Hesperus was a couple hundred years too old to feel threatened by a child.

“Of course, Mr. Sakamaki.” Hesperus took a moment to gloat over the teenager’s startled expression before continuing. “I wouldn’t refuse a request from such a... responsible upperclassman like yourself.” (Even though you smell as though you bathe in carcinogens.)

Reiji Sakamaki did not attempt to fake a smile, seeming to conduct himself in a businesslike manner. The young vampire was remarkably put together, as though he had memorized the perfect student and strove to become the image of that perfect student. Even if his violet-tinted hair did look as if it was in an awkward growing-out stage and he had not bothered to trim it, only combing it back like it looked better that way. (It didn’t.)

“I have a few questions I would like to ask you privately.”

Deciding to bait the vampire for his own amusement, Hesperus rose from his desk with alarming fluidity not present in humans. He let the glamour slip from his eyes for less than a fraction of a second before he responded with a nod. “Lead the way.”

Tsuneo would have been afraid of an upperclassman. He would have been anxious to follow this man so far from the classroom and into empty halls with empty classrooms. But Hesperus was taking the time to at least partially memorize the route. Just in case someone attempted to attack him as his Queen had warned.

They soon came upon yet another empty classroom but this one was unlocked. Upon further inspection, it seemed to be a chemistry lab. Reiji closed the door behind Hesperus.  
A small prick was followed by a flood of cold liquid that entered the artery in Hesperus’s neck. A supernaturally strengthened arm wrapped around his torso to keep him from struggling away. After a moment, he was let go.

“You are going to tell me what business you have with my family.”

Hesperus turned, eyebrow raised at the second eldest son. The cold liquid had yet to take effect. That is, if it actually could effect a being like him. To humor the possibility, the gentleman dropped the glamour in his eyes.

“Am I, second son?”

Reiji’s eyes surveyed the shorter man carefully, as if committing each detail to memory. A moment later he crossed his arms to wait for an explanation.

“I will not repeat myself, Tsuneo.” The name was hissed as if it in itself was a curse.

Hesperus closed his eyes, mulling it over. He could just get it over with now and tell him. Maybe the father would be called and this debt could be sorted out the civilized way. Or he could continue the Queen’s way and possibly get killed. But it would take even this chemically-scented vampire weeks to figure out how to kill him.

He halts his train of thought. Those of both Summer and Winter Courts cannot lie. Most of his changeling traits have long since vanished— including the ability to lie.

“It is my duty to repay my Lady’s debt,” he responds. “I have no other reasons for uprooting myself and planting my life somewhere I have no place.”

The young vampire gave an exhale of disapproval.

“We have no need for bodyguards and we have enough servants. Her debt is inconsequential.”

Hesperus almost rolled his eyes at his arrogant charge, but decided to instead formulate a plan. With the plan in his head and sweet words on his tongue, he spoke.

“Your brothers are an ill-behaved lot. If you value your family’s reputation, you can allow me to teach them to be gentlemen.”

“I don’t see what that has to do with me,” Reiji said with a tinge of annoyance on his features.

“You are the only one best-suited to be your father’s heir. If I were to... make it seem as though the field were even, your father would feel as though you were all given the same chance to prove yourselves. And maybe he won’t kill your brothers for their incompetence after choosing you. Killing is the ultimate show of love for your kind, correct?”

Hesperus watched his charge dwell on his last sentence. Envy pervaded the air around the Sakamaki siblings like a poisonous gas. If that was not fixed, all would choke on their own plans to usurp the others. Karlheinz would have no legitimate heirs to continue his legacy. Though there were some rumors of paramours and bastards produced by those affairs, both the young gentleman and his Queen knew that respectable men had no need for bastard children.

Reiji’s eyes narrowed, suspicious of Tsuneo.

“My kind?”

“Pure-blood vampires. You’ve already guessed that we’re not the same.”

The deception on his lips felt like a drug. Powerful, potent, and so, so sweet. He almost licked his lips at the thought of the new mask he only partially created. It only took Reiji to fill in the gaps.

It took little more to sufficiently cater to the young vampire’s inferiority complex.

 

“I am Tsuneo Akiyama, your new tutor,” the gentleman said with a deep bow. The glamour of his eyes and clothes were still intact in front of the four youngest brothers.

“Yours truly has no need for tutoring. Especially not from a pipsqueak,” said Ayato, still disheveled from sleeping on a bench in the entrance hall.

Hesperus’s eyes narrowed, his annoyance changing his glamour only slightly to convey his irritation.

“I assure you, third son, this ‘pipsqueak’ knows far more than you.”

Kanato laughed at this, muttering all the while to his stuffed bear. A lonely child with sadistic urges.

Laito barely paid attention, instead scrutinizing Tsuneo’s appearance. A playboy that made Hesperus’s skin crawl. He was sure to have a place in the Summer Court if the rumors were true. That decadence could serve him well but at what cost?

Subaru stayed silent, probably stewing in bitter distaste for his brothers.

“My only purpose here is to mold you into a suitable heir should one of you meet an untimely demise after the demise of your father.”

“And if one of us doesn’t want to be an heir?” Subaru said, rubellite eyes briefly meeting the gentleman’s glamoured ones.

“Then we can discuss that further. Alone.” He emphasized the last word, knowing fully well that there was more than a chance that Subaru would not agree to those terms.

Laito and Ayato abruptly teleported. Kanato muttered more to his bear and slowly made his way back to what Hesperus assumed to be his room.

“I suppose we can discuss this now, then.”

 

To put it kindly, Subaru’s room was a bit of a mess. But if you were more than four hundred years old and lived in the immaculate Winter Court for most of those years, it looked as though multiple natural disasters had swept through the room all at the same time. Furniture was strewn about the room, some of it splintered into pieces and others missing key components: a legless chair, a table with half of the top missing, and others in such states of disrepair. Not to mention paper and clothing that seemed to carpet the already carpeted floor of the room. His silvery coffin seemed to be the only thing that wasn’t completely wrecked.

However, there was one thing in the room Hesperus could not ignore. He felt its presence weighing down on him with every step he took. Iron fireplace tools and an iron grate to house the logs. All cast-iron, but iron nonetheless. Small traces of iron were throughout the house, but all were contained within closed rooms.

With an exhale, Hesperus substituted his weariness from the iron with wariness for the mess.

“I understand that perfection is not something to be asked of a sixteen-year-old, but it would do you well to clean up every once in a while.”

Subaru sat on his coffin, arms crossed.

“You said you wanted to talk about me being an heir. Start talking.”

Though the gentleman found it extremely unadvisable to shut the door behind himself and seal himself in a room with iron, he did just that to preserve his new pupil’s privacy.

“We can start with why you don’t want to be your father’s heir.”

“Because I hate the bastard.”

The gentleman raised an eyebrow. This was not part of the plan. What would the Queen think of him if he allowed this hatred to stew inside of this child?

“‘Hate’ is quite a strong word.”

“I’m going to kill him one day. He’ll know why I did it.”

Never mind. “Hate” is not a strong enough word for the venom that dripped from Subaru’s words.

Hesperus had to be quick.

“Would it not cause him more pain to see that you’ve changed to be a perfect heir, only for you to kill him when he trusts you most?”

Subaru scoffed.

“He doesn’t trust anyone, dumbass.”

Hesperus said nothing as he tried to rework the structure he’d imagined. Karlheinz was not revered as his Queen had led him to believe. He had no choice but to sift through his memories living as a human son.

He placed a hand in his pocket, holding a pine needle between his fingers. He vanished without another word.


	2. Iron Sickness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Hesperus gets sick and can do barely anything to defend himself. That is, unless he uses the gifts given to him by the Court.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is where the sexual harassment comes in because this is Diabolik Lovers and pretty much everyone is accustomed to it. However, it’s only going to be a couple paragraphs towards the end if you need to skip it.

Outside of the manor Hesperus had to catch his breath. The pine needle trick drained most of his energy, leaving little for the glamour he spent weeks preparing. However he found solace at the top of the tree he’d been transported to and allowed himself to absorb the energy from it. As the sun rose, he dropped his glamour completely.

If he wasn’t repaying his Queen’s debt he would be rushing around her court. The Ladies and Gentlemen and other Gentry would pay him no mind. At the very end of the day, he was allowed to speak to his Queen in her private bedchambers. They would speak of servants’ affairs and possible plots from other Courts, and occasionally just rest beside each other. There were whispers of an illicit affair between them, but those who spoke of such things were quickly dealt with. A Queen has little use for a returned Changeling besides errands outside the realm.

A strong gust of wind nearly blew him over, the sky changing to an overcast night. 

Hesperus struggled to remember his glamour’s exact specifications through the haze of his fatigue. Green eyes to dark brown... soil? No, they’re still eyes. Uniform... black blazer, black pants, black dress shoes, and a white button-down with a black tie. He could forgo the tie, as the dress code was not as strict as he’d previously imagined it to be.

It took him little more than an hour to get himself to school. Hesperus was not as late as he’d imagined himself to be, but he was still late. 

Two quick steps into the building were halted by a strong arm nearly clothes-lining him.

Hesperus’s eyes slowly followed the arm of the tan sweater to the face looking down at him. The blue-eyed vampire was a good six inches taller than him, without a regard for proper conduct. Especially considering his earbuds were still inside his ears as he spoke.

“Don’t put them through this,” his slow, soft voice rumbled. “They don’t deserve it.”

Before the gentleman could reply, Shu Sakamaki vanished into thin air.

It was not Shu’s place to decide but he was head of the household by birthright since their father was away. Karlheinz had been away for almost a century, if Hesperus remembered correctly. Leaving children to govern themselves never led to anything good. Think of Lord of the Flies, except teenagers. Teenagers (who are chronologically not teenagers, as Hesperus recently learned) who are also vampires.

/-/

It was not hard for Hesperus to become a permanent fixture of the Sakamaki household. He was the tutor of the four youngest and rarely interacted with them outside of that. 

Kanato would throw tantrums when “Tsuneo” randomly showed up in his room. Ayato attempted to fight “Tsuneo” on sight. Laito was prone to attempting seduction, which led to uncomfortable psychoanalysis by “Tsuneo” and close encounters involving blood-like fluids that were not blood. Subaru also had mock-therapy sessions with “Tsuneo”, but half the time it involved throwing out things that Subaru had previously destroyed.

Most of what Hesperus was doing was trying to work around these boys’ psychological blocks and they were all fighting him every step of the way. This was not supposed to be his repayment. He was to help them become better heirs, not train them like unruly mutts. 

His karmic repayment for appearing in the younger brothers’ rooms without warning came in the form of second-eldest Reiji standing in the guest room he’d been given.

“I don’t see the point of allowing you to live here if there is no progress.”

Hesperus exhaled sharply.

“You cannot see the progress because every single one of you are unfit to be heirs,” he said, trying to mask the rage in his voice. “You, in particular, have an inferiority complex that makes you so gullible that Shu somehow manages to become head of the family.”

Anger flashed in Reiji’s eyes for a moment. He slammed his hand into Hesperus’s throat.

“I am not gullible,” Reiji spat, close enough to Hesperus that he could feel the vapor from the vampire’s mouth on his ear.

“Yet you allowed me here to fix your chances of becoming heir,” the gentleman choked out as a bitter laugh escaped him. “How deplorable.”

It took a moment before Reiji let go, sniffing the air. With a monstrous look on his face, he vanished from the room.

/-/

With the arrival of a new visitor, Tsuneo was locked inside of the bedroom. All Hesperus could do was pick up clues by eavesdropping and focusing all his thoughts on the new smell that permeated the halls of the mansion. He heard a lot about a girl called “tit-less” who smelled like clean linen and purity. After two days passed, the linen smell gave way to fear and adrenaline sweat. 

The purity put Hesperus into a new haze. This den of bloodlust would turn her into a shell. She would never escape. The vampires would never let her. She must stay pure. They would only dirty her and create a disgusting, useless, broken doll.

The Gentry can keep her pure in the Winter Court. She belongs with the Winter Court.

He broke out of his room with no injuries to speak of except for a slightly bruised shoulder. His frenzied movements lead him to a closed door with the sound of sobbing behind it.

A knock made the girl sharply inhale and abruptly stop crying.

“G-go away!” she stuttered out. 

“I’m not one of them,” he said slowly. “We haven’t met. My name is Vesper.”

He heard the bedsprings creak and her footsteps come close to the door. She smelled like purity and bittersweet... something.

“Are you a vampire too?” she whispered.

“No, thankfully.” Hesperus waited a moment before revealing his intentions. “I want to help you.”

“You can’t.”

The girl was afraid, he could understand that much. She was nothing more than a blood bag for the vampires to feed upon. If the mood changed slightly for any of them (especially Laito) she would be nothing more but a living, breathing sex toy for their sadistic pleasure.

“They won’t let you go unless you die or if you succeed.”

There’s a pause as he heard the floorboards creak beneath her. She sounded as if she settled on the floor. 

“Succeed in what?”

Hesperus had to think for more than a few moments. He didn’t actually know what she needed to “succeed” in. She was called a bride and the previous ones did not succeed. This girl was human. The rest must have been.

“I will help you find your way,” he said firmly. “One day I will give you a name and you will owe a small debt. Do not eat or drink anything after you say the name. No matter what anyone tells you—even me.”

As a child, Hesperus had hated the way adults had always spoke cryptically around him. They were usually talking about him and his “oddities”, sometimes right in front of him. But everything became clear when he’d found his way back to the Winter Court. Maybe she would feel the same.

With those last words fresh in his mind, he left her with more questions than answers. The gentleman found himself walking through winding corridors and ended up in Subaru’s room once more.

“I thought Reiji locked you in,” Subaru said, closing his book as he stood. The confusion on his face was plain as day, contorting his handsome face.

Hesperus blinked.

“You believe it’s hard to break open a door? Or to climb out of a window?” he asked in astonished disbelief. He pressed a hand against his heart, the gray wool soft against his palm.

“You aren’t a vampire?”

Hesperus had to figure out what that meant after he found the time to explain himself. His hand dropped back to his side.

“Reiji came to that conclusion on his own.”

“Then—“

“Tell me about the human.”

Subaru glared at him, placing his book down on his recently cleaned side table. His confusion was easily masked by his frustration in being cut off. Rubellite eyes bore holes into...

Hesperus remembered his eyes’ glamour, but not quickly enough. The irises bloomed from green to brown in less than a millisecond and his clothing... well, his clothing was fine. He brought some clothes—gifts from his Queen—to save energy on the rest of his glamour.

“What the hell?” the youngest Sakamaki nearly shouted, eyes wide.

“Tell me about the human and I will explain everything.”

Hesperus felt his heart nearly skip a beat. A pact. A true pact with someone who could live to fulfill it. If he wasn’t so deep in his haze, he would have cried tears of relief. All he could think about was that human girl behind the door.

“How the hell am I supposed to know? She just showed up one day and we weren’t allowed to kill her. Shu’s the only one who actually knows the guy who brought her here.”

A pact fulfilled halfway. Not hard to complete it.

Hesperus smiled, coming to his own private realization. It would be easy, but entrapment was more fulfilling than just finishing a pact in the space of five minutes.

“I will be sure to find him.”

He turned to the door, hand on the doorknob.

“We aren’t done yet!” Subaru called in outrage.

That warm, thrumming feeling in Hesperus’s chest was more than worth the turmoil of a young, immature vampire. It was wondrous in every aspect. He could finally understand the purpose of making so many pacts with foolish humans and other equally foolish creatures, only to wait to finish the bargain.

“I never said when I would explain it, did I?”

Almost instantaneously he found himself slammed against a wall, crumpling over a fist in his stomach. A fit of coughs racked his body as he tried to regain his breath. Dark green fluid dripped from his mouth from biting his tongue. The scent of rotting leaves and freshly cut grass erupted from the wound.

Subaru pulled away when he saw it, letting Hesperus slide to the ground.

“What the hell are you?”

He decided to tread the line between useful and disobedient and paid for it. Even if the Sakamaki family had no idea what he was, they would know that he was inhuman. That would be enough for someone to attack him. For Reiji to experiment on him.

He now understood the reason for conditions added to pacts with humans. It was foolish of him to believe he could accomplish this monumental task without spilling his own blood. Or what he considered his “blood”.

“Not human,” Hesperus rasped. “Not vampiric. Not a shapeshifter.”

Seeming to forget his initial disgust towards the green liquid, Subaru grabbed him up by the shirt collar. “Then tell me what you are,” he growled, emphasizing each word.

With an exhale, Hesperus let go of the illusion he had spent so much time cultivating, leaving a tired changeling in the place of the dubious tutor. His skin went from porcelain white to the moss-stained gray of a home long forgotten. His eyes regained their sharp green as his teeth became acicular once more. His nails, too, became sharper to inflict cruel tricks on mortals within his Queen’s domain.

“I am a faerie, here on behalf of my Queen to repay a debt,” he said, needle-like teeth giving him a slight lisp. “Fae have an ability called a glamour— which I have just shed — that can change our appearances within a certain range of believability. If that is all, I will seek out your brother and compile the information I need.”

Subaru only pushed him further into the wall, undoubtedly creating a dent where Hesperus’s body was shoved.

“Why do you need to know about the human?”

“Humans are foolish creatures. I was afraid she would get herself into trouble and die. My kind are very sensitive... towards death.” The half-truth that fell from his lips sent a sharp pain into his left eye. Over-generalizations hurt, but not persistently.

Subaru let go of him, allowing the frayed remnants of Hesperus’s will to bind themselves once more into the glamour of Tsuneo Akiyama. All that was once sharp became rounded or blunt. He still looked too young for his age without the glamour, but at least he looked nonthreatening to humans now.

“You’re lucky that it was me,” the youngest Sakamaki muttered.

Hesperus could only smile as he left the room.

/-/

It was one thing to say that he was going to find Shu, but it was another to actually figure out where the eldest Sakamaki was. Hesperus spent about an hour and a half wandering the mansion only to realize that the iron surrounding him was making him walk in circles.

“Are you lost, Shota-chan?” a familiar voice purred from behind him.

Though Hesperus was in a haze and spent the last few hundred years in the Winter Court, he was well-aware of the name’s connotations. A prepubescent boy used for the pleasure of adults.

“I am far older than you, fifth son,” he ground out through grit teeth. He could already feel the glamour start to slip, his tongue running over his slightly sharpened teeth.

The iron was clouding his judgement. He needed to find his way out of the mansion before he keeled over. He needed to leave before he felt the long-term effects of staying within proximity of such impurity for so long.

Before he knew it, Laito had him caged between his arms against a wall, licking his lips. 

“So she effects you, too,” he murmured. “You might be more grown up than I thought.”

“I am five hundred and sixty three years old. I will not be mocked by a child wearing a man’s face,” Hesperus hissed. It was getting harder for him to see distinct shapes. The vampire’s stench of impurity was the only thing that kept him from shoving him away with what little strength he had left.

Laito only pressed in closer, a knee slowly inching its way up between the other’s legs. Tsuneo’s height made it far too easy for that knee to possibly grind into his groin.

“You aren’t fooling anybody, Shota-chan. Just let go for a little bit. No harm, no foul.”

“Is that what your mother told you before she went off to see another lover?” the gentleman asked, venom dripping from every word.

The knee dropped. Something deadly flashed in Laito’s eyes. 

Slender fingers wrapped around Hesperus’s neck, cutting off the faerie’s blood supply instead of his air. He was pushed farther up the wall by Laito’s inhuman strength. Precision like that could very well lead to death if he wasn’t strong enough to escape.

Hesperus was more than used to seeing such wrathful expressions, but only now did he realize how much the iron was affecting him. His vision swam, then doubled, reminding him of the ice that separated him from Queen Morana on his first meeting. Only this time, it was caused by a vampire cursed to be 17 for too many years and the iron that surrounded him.

“Laito, stop it!” a high, desperate voice called. The little blonde human was already tugging at the vampire’s arm.

A jerk of his elbow knocked her to the ground. Fear was etched into her features as Laito glared down at her.

The movement was enough for Hesperus to split his tongue open again on his own teeth and spit on the vampire’s sleeve. It wasn’t much, but it was enough to start burning through the blazer like acid. 

The acrid smoke made Laito let go immediately to shed his outer layers.

With the distraction in place, Hesperus sprinted past him and grabbed the human up. A hand in his vest pocket gave him hope in the form of a dried bay leaf. That is, before the iron turned his world (and his body) to jelly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now we know what the blood-like fluid that isn’t actually blood is.


End file.
